HotelTonight Review: Airbnb’s Last-Minute Hotel App, Rooms Until 2am and 10% Back in Credit

HotelTonight is a free hotel booking app built around one idea: hotels would rather sell an empty room cheaply tonight than not sell it at all. You open it, see a short, curated list of places with rooms going spare, and book in a few taps. It has been owned by Airbnb since 2019.

We like it for two specific reasons: the selection is small enough to choose from on a station platform with 4% battery, and in the UK and US every stay now earns 10% back in Airbnb credit. Here is our HotelTonight review: what is free (all of it), where the catches hide, and how it stacks up against Booking.com and Hotels.com.

Offer detail	What you get
Promo Code	None needed. There is no public HotelTonight code; existing users can share personal invite codes
Welcome offer	HT Perks Level 1 from your first booking: an extra 5% off on the app, plus 10% of the room rate back in Airbnb credit in the UK and US
Who qualifies	Anyone with a HotelTonight account; the Airbnb credit is for UK and US travellers, new and returning
Key terms	Most rooms are non-refundable and cannot be changed; Airbnb credit excludes taxes and fees and expires a year after your stay; promotions cannot be combined
How to claim	Download the app, book a stay, then link your Airbnb account after checkout to claim the credit

HotelTonight at a glance

• Owner: Airbnb (app seller: Hotel Tonight Inc; HotelTonight, LLC)
• Launched: founded in December 2010 in San Francisco; the iPhone app arrived in January 2011
• Platforms: iPhone, iPad, Apple Vision, Android and the web at hoteltonight.com
• Free plan: yes, the app is entirely free; there is no subscription
• Paid from: nothing to pay for the app; you pay only for rooms, plus taxes and any HT service fee shown at checkout
• Offline use: no; you need a connection to search and book
• Ratings: App Store (UK) 4.8/5 from 8.8k ratings; Google Play 4.0 from 70.1k reviews; Trustpilot 1.3/5 from 445 reviews

Our verdict

HotelTonight is very good at one job: finding a decent bed fast when you need one tonight. The list is short by design, the hotel often decides the room type when you arrive, and most bookings cannot be cancelled. Use it for the night itself, and check one other site before you tap Book.

Pros

• Completely free, with no subscription tier to talk you into
• Curated list of partner hotels, so you are not scrolling through 300 options at midnight
• HT Perks discounts start at your first booking and status never expires
• 10% of the room rate back as Airbnb credit in the UK and US
• Price Guarantee pays the difference in credit if you spot a cheaper public rate soon after booking
• Bookable until 2am on the night of the stay (hotel local time)

Cons

• Most rooms are non-refundable and cannot be changed or transferred
• Room type is often assigned at check-in rather than chosen by you
• Far fewer hotels than Booking.com or Expedia
• Price Guarantee and referral rewards come as HotelTonight credit, not cash
• Trustpilot reviews are dominated by complaints about overbooked hotels and slow support

What HotelTonight does and who it is for

HotelTonight sells discounted rooms from hotels it chooses to partner with. Its pitch on the App Store is simple: “Hotels give us discounts on their unsold rooms and you get to book amazing hotels at great prices.” It started as a same-day app, stretched to a week ahead in 2014 and now lets you book up to 100 days before check-in, for stays of up to 14 nights and up to four rooms at a time.

Where it earns its place is in the awkward moments travel throws up:

• Your 21:50 flight from Gatwick is cancelled, the airline’s hotel queue snakes past Boots, and you would rather pay for a room near Victoria than sleep on a bench.
• A Saturday in Manchester runs late, the last train home has gone, and you need somewhere central within walking distance of the bar.
• You arrive at a guesthouse in Edinburgh to find the room is not what the photos promised, and you want out tonight.

It suits people whose plans are fixed for the night, not a family fortnight in Cornwall booked months ahead.

Is HotelTonight free? What you pay for

The app costs nothing and there is no premium tier. You pay for the room, and HotelTonight shows taxes and fees before you confirm. Those can include an HT service fee as well as local hotel taxes, and they vary by location, so the headline rate is not always the final number.

Discounts come from HT Perks (below), “DEAL” badges on rates below the usual HotelTonight price, and Daily Drop: a personalised deal in some destinations that, once revealed, you have 15 minutes to book before it may vanish.

The “was” price HotelTonight shows next to a deal is the highest HotelTonight rate for that hotel and those dates in the past 30 days, not the hotel’s own rack rate. That is a fair benchmark, but a generous one.

HotelTonight price: HT Perks levels and the cheapest way to pay

There are no plans to buy. The closest thing to a price list is HT Perks, which HotelTonight sets out in US dollars and calculates on lifetime spend, excluding refunds and any credits or coupons you used. Sterling and euro figures below are conversions.

HT Perks level	You reach it at	£	€	What it adds
Level 1	First booking	£0	€0	Extra 5% off on the app, location-based rates
Level 2	$250 spent	£187.60	€222.65	5% off on all platforms
Level 3	$1,000 spent	£750.40	€890.60	Special discounts at selected hotels
Level 4 and up	$2,000, then every extra $1,000	£1,500.80, then £750.40	€1,781.20, then €890.60	More hotel discounts; from Level 5, a $30 (about £22.51) credit per level
Level 8 and up	$6,000 spent	£4,502.40	€5,343.60	Extra discounts on top

No blackout dates, and your level never drops; perks apply at participating hotels only.

The cheapest way to pay. Book in the app rather than on the website while you are at Level 1, because the extra 5% is app-only until Level 2. In the UK and US, link your Airbnb account after checkout so the 10% credit lands; it is worked out on the room rate before taxes and fees and lasts a year. Then spend 30 seconds comparing the same hotel on one other site, because the Price Guarantee window is short.

HotelTonight promo codes, invite codes and the Price Guarantee

There is no public HotelTonight promo code. Each user has an invite code: “Give $25/Get $25” at Levels 1 and 2, rising to $50 from Level 3. A $25 code only works on a first booking above a minimum value, each code works once and promotions cannot be stacked. Any “HotelTonight promo code” on a voucher site is, at best, somebody else’s invite code.

The Price Guarantee is more useful. Find a lower public rate for the same hotel, dates, room type and cancellation terms and HotelTonight adds the difference as credit, up to $400 (about £300). You have two hours to claim on same-day bookings, until midnight for next-day check-ins and 24 hours otherwise. The credit has no cash value and expires after a year.

HotelTonight features that matter

Speed. “Three taps, one swipe, and you are booked!” is the app’s own line, and the short, categorised list helps.

Booking window. Up to 100 days ahead, and until 2am on the first night. That late cut-off is the feature that matters most when a delayed train drops you in York after midnight.

Room assignment. Many bookings give you a guaranteed bed count rather than a named room. Where the hotel allows, you can choose one or two beds. Larry L. put it neatly on Google Play in July 2026: “One thing that they don’t make clear to you is that the hotel picks the room that you get.”

Incidentals. You still need a credit card at check-in. Debit cards may trigger a real charge rather than a hold, and some hotels refuse them.

Offline. None. Screenshot your confirmation before you lose signal on the Underground.

Privacy and safety

HotelTonight’s App Store privacy label lists coarse location, identifiers, usage data and diagnostics as linked to you, including for advertising and marketing. HotelTonight says it is PCI compliant and does not store card numbers. When DailyStoke looked, we found no regulator action against HotelTonight itself.

The safety question most people mean is “will my room be there?” A recurring Trustpilot theme is arriving to find the hotel has oversold. Keep the confirmation handy and save the support number: in the UK it is +44 20 3389 6615, and help@hoteltonight.com promises replies within 24 hours.

What users say about HotelTonight

HotelTonight scores 4.8 out of 5 from 8,800 ratings on the UK App Store and 4.0 from about 70,100 reviews on Google Play. On Trustpilot it scores 1.3 from 445 reviews, 85% of them one star: Trustpilot is where people go when a booking goes wrong.

On the UK App Store, Andew P wrote in June 2022: “I’ve never had an issue having to extend my stay because I’ve always found a hotel within 10 minutes.”

On Google Play, Melissa C. praised the human side in September 2026: “What really stood out was the customer service, and to me that is worth so much.”

On Trustpilot, Warris B. from the US described the worst case in June 2026: “I arrived on a business trip with a confirmed reservation that I paid for, and there are NO rooms available.”

How to get started with HotelTonight, and how to cancel

1. Download HotelTonight from the App Store or Google Play, or go to hoteltonight.com.
2. Create an account.
3. Allow location for nearby deals, or type a city.
4. Pick a hotel and check the bed count, total with taxes and fees, and cancellation terms.
5. Pay, and screenshot the confirmation.
6. After your stay, link your Airbnb account when prompted (UK and US) to collect the 10% credit.

Cancelling a booking. Most rooms are labelled “non-refundable, non-cancellable”. If your checkout terms allow changes, follow them in the app. If not, contact HotelTonight support, who will ask the hotel; any refund is at its discretion. There is no subscription to cancel, so deleting the app is enough to leave; for account questions, email help@hoteltonight.com.

HotelTonight vs Booking.com vs Hotels.com

	HotelTonight	Booking.com	Hotels.com
Free plan	Yes, app is free	Yes, app is free	Yes, app is free
Paid from	No paid tier	No paid tier (Genius loyalty is free)	No paid tier (One Key rewards are free)
Best for	Same-day and next-day stays	Choice, flexible cancellation, longer trips	Collecting rewards across Expedia brands
Offline	Needs a connection to search and book	Needs a connection to search and book	Needs a connection to search and book
App Store rating (UK)	4.8 (8.8k)	4.8 (1.3m)	4.7 (279k)

Pick HotelTonight when it is already evening, you know where you are sleeping and you want a short list of decent hotels with a discount and some Airbnb credit on top.

Pick Booking.com when choice and free cancellation matter more than the last few pounds, or when you are booking ahead. A NerdWallet comparison in St Petersburg, Florida found 16 properties on HotelTonight against 52 on Booking.com for the same night.

Pick Hotels.com if you already collect One Key rewards with Expedia or Vrbo.

HotelTonight alternatives

• Booking.com: the default for most UK travellers, with a huge range, plenty of free-cancellation rates and free Genius loyalty discounts.
• Hotels.com: Expedia’s hotel brand, whose One Key rewards work across sister sites.
• Hostelworld: for a cheaper bed in a big city, a hostel private room often beats a last-minute hotel. See our Hostelworld review.
• Airbnb: better for longer or group stays, and where your HotelTonight credit gets spent.
• TrustedHousesitters: if you can plan ahead and like animals, free stays in exchange for pet care. Our TrustedHousesitters review explains the catch.

HotelTonight FAQs

Is HotelTonight legit?
Yes. It has run since 2010 and Airbnb has owned it since 2019. Complaints mostly involve oversold hotels or non-refundable bookings.

How far in advance can you book on HotelTonight?
Up to 100 days ahead, and as late as 2am on the night of your stay, hotel local time. Stays can last up to 14 nights.

Can you cancel a HotelTonight booking?
Usually not. Most rooms are non-refundable and cannot be changed. Check the terms at checkout; where changes are allowed, they are at the hotel’s discretion.

Why is HotelTonight so cheap?
Hotels discount rooms they expect to go unsold. Deals are not always cheaper than elsewhere, so compare once before booking.

Is there a HotelTonight promo code?
There is no public code. Existing users have invite codes worth $25 on a qualifying first booking, and HT Perks gives an extra 5% off app bookings from your first stay.

Does HotelTonight work in the UK?
Yes, with UK hotels, UK phone support and the 10% Airbnb credit.

Visit HotelTonight

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